Fiera Real Estate has published its 2021 ESG report. How businesses deal with environmental, social and governance issues has been brought to the forefront, particularly as a result of the global climate crisis. All stakeholders including, in particular, investors are increasing the pressure for transparent reporting on ESG initiatives and results.

Fiera recognises the significant impact that the built environment has on climate change and state that they are committed to driving change to reduce this impact. The installation of innovative technologies to streamline data collection is recognised as essential to achieve this end.

Some highlights from the Fiera report are:

• increased global green building certification rate to 89%;
• reduced energy consumption by 6% and saved over 6 million litres of water;
• developed action plans to better embed diversity, equity and inclusion considerations into processes;
• trained 100% of employees on ESG matters;
• raised over 120,000 USD for charity, including £22,000 to provide 500 mental health sessions for NHS workers in the UK;
• reduced GHG emissions by 5% globally (equivalent to removing 6,400 cars from the road);
• achieved Living Wage Employer Accreditation for their FRE UK Long Income Fund;
• engaged with tenants on ESG at 79% of properties; and
• introduced a Sustainable Design Brief setting minimum environmental and social targets for all UK funded development projects.

Fiera acknowledge that this is just the beginning of the road for their carbon reduction and that some of the reduction in energy consumption and emissions results from a shift to working from home following the Covid-19 pandemic. With the property industry still with a long way to go on the road to Net Zero, it is great to see businesses such as Fiera leading the charge.